MIAMI, FL – MARCH 11: Tiger Woods hits his approach shot on the sixth hole during the final round of the World Golf Championships-Cadillac Championship on the TPC Blue Monster at Doral Golf Resort And Spa on March 11, 2012 in Miami, Florida.

ROSWELL, Ga. — Oil executive Ben Kenny has spent 2½ years and $24 million improving his golf course along the banks of the Chattahoochee River, adding lakes, streams, a new putting green and driving range.

Kenny is also adding a tennis and swim center with French Open-style red-clay courts at Horseshoe Bend Country Club, 22 miles north of Atlanta. He’s confident the upgrades at the 40-year-old course, where golfer Phil Mickelson won three American Junior Golf Association Tournament of Champions titles, will pay off.

“People think I’m crazy, but I’m not crazy,” said Kenny, 70, president of Atlanta-based petroleum-storage firm Perimeter Oil Co., who bought Horseshoe Bend for $6.1 million three years ago. “If you run the revenue numbers, I view it as a very solid investment.”

Course owners and real estate investors are betting on a comeback following a downturn that was “by far the toughest ever in the industry,” according to Charles Staples, co-founder of Fore Golf, which has 12 courses in Florida, Virginia and Maryland.

Property prices are climbing and shutdowns have slowed as recreational golfers return to the hobby after scaling back club memberships during the recession.

Prices for U.S. golf courses climbed 57 percent in 2013, said Steven Ekovich, vice president of investments at Marcus & Millichap Inc.’s National Golf & Resort Properties Group. The average sale price was $4.25 million last year for operational, regulation-length golf courses with at least 18 holes valued at $250,000 to $75 million.

“After bottoming out in 2012, the golf-course sales market looks to be recovering and stabilizing,” Ekovich said. “Bank financing is slowly returning, the average sales price is rebounding, there are fewer foreclosures and bank repossessions, and more courses are back to producing positive cash flow.”

Last month, Manassas, Va.-based Fore Golf completed the sale of Feather Sound Country Club in Clearwater, Fla., to Premier Club Holdings for $5.13 million. The club was on the market for only about three months, Staples said.

In 2013, CBRE Group’s Golf & Resort Properties division brokered the most sales of 18-hole, stand-alone golf courses in eight years. It sold 15 courses for an average price of $4.59 million, compared with an eight-year low of $1.18 million in 2011. The peak of $7.23 million was reached in 2006.

“There are two different concepts in the golf business: the joining and playing, so the business side and the transaction side of things,” said Jeff Woolson, executive vice president and managing director at CBRE’s golf division. “Both have improved.”

Private-club membership numbers are improving most at top-performing courses, according to Henry DeLozier, principal at Toronto-based Global Golf Advisors.

At Donald Trump’s 13 U.S. courses, including Doral and Trump National Golf Club Los Angeles, membership numbers have increased each year and dues haven’t dropped, even during the economic slump, said his son Eric Trump, executive vice president of development and acquisitions for Trump Organization.

“For our type of members, the last recession just meant joining one or two instead of four or five of the best courses,” he said. “The existing membership at all of our courses has gone up every year.”

Trump said the company “invests heavily” in its courses to increase customer loyalty, including $250 million put into Doral after its 2012 purchase of the course, where Tiger Woods won his 76th PGA Tour event last year. The resort has five courses, including the Blue Monster, on 800 acres.

AirPods have become a rare public misstep for Apple. In September, Apple marketing chief Phil Schiller hailed the earbuds as the entree to a wireless future, with seamless connection to an iPhone and a five-hour battery life.

The brokerage industry’s self-regulator has asked employees fired by Wells Fargo & Co. and stripped of their securities registrations to come forward if they have concerns over their treatment, the latest sign of growing scrutiny on the bank.

Ford Motor Co. is going ahead with plans to move small-car production from the U.S. to Mexico despite President-elect Donald Trump’s recent threats to impose tariffs on companies that move work abroad.